What’s up guys so my tuner was doing some cleaning up on my map and we noticed that the air temp was reading very slow.they were reading 114f even though the car wasn’t warmed up. While driving and idling the sensor is very slow to change I saw temps going up to 140 while driving on the highway. I have a front mount intercooler stock turbo.the air temp sensor is a haltech sensor 1/8 npt threaded into the throttle body elbow and I was under the impression that they are fast reacting. Is this an indication of a sensor failure?

 

Is it correctly calibrated? The 1/8" sensors have their own calibration that is different than the default settings. Check that first. Second, at idle and low throttle angles, the air in the intake tract will heat soak and get hot. So it's not uncommon for it to be much warmer than ambient during those conditions. I wouldn't expect 140F but 110F on an 80F ambient day wouldn't be out of the ordinary. Once you open the throttle and the air begins to move, the temp should drop quickly and, the turbo isn't completely undersized and the intercooler is fairly effective, intake temps should be closer to ambient once they stabilize under WOT conditions.

 

To be honest I’m not too sure on how the sensor was calibrated. I can ask and find out. Also I forgot to mention. At first before my tuner made the adjustments he did. The car would shut off almost every time it came to a stop and idle hunt like it wants to shut off. It would idle horrible and if I unplug the air temp sensor it would smoothen right up. Could this also be a effect of it not being calibrated ? Thanks for all the input

 

We calibrated the sensor and it reads correctly now thank you Chris. It’s still heatsoaking so I think I’ll move it from the throttle body elbow and closer to the front of the car